


Child, Choice, and Crocodiles

by magistrate



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-08
Updated: 2011-09-08
Packaged: 2017-10-23 13:17:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/250708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magistrate/pseuds/magistrate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: #143. Janet Frasier, Sha're. Practicalities.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Child, Choice, and Crocodiles

**Author's Note:**

> As usual, I'm stealing stuff from ancient Egyptian texts. The snippets here come from the Deir el-Medina record, and the Hymns to the Aten found in the Tomb of Ay.

Janet brought her a mug of tea in the small of the night. Sha're was shaking as she accepted the cup, with the infirmary blanket swept off her legs and bundled around her shoulders, and she was grateful for the first time that the woman had kept her in this place. More grateful when the woman pulled up a stool and perched on it, hand careful on her own mug, and said "Do you want to talk about it?"

Sha're rolled the mug between her hands. The heat biting through the ceramic was comforting, like the harness of a mastage who'd been sitting in the desert sun all day. It stung her palms, but it was a familiar, earthy sting. But the smell of the tea was different from anything she'd had on Abydos, or anything Amonet had indulged herself in.

"Is that also your profession?" she asked, keeping her eyes on the liquid, her voice low. "To hear confessions?"

Janet leaned forward. She was a small woman, impeccably groomed, but Sha're's eyes kept slipping over the rim of the mug to her hands, and her own fingers curled in. The doctor's hands were groomed but calloused. Strange. Sha're's hands had always been calloused, though her status had kept them from ever being broken. Even the daughter of the high priest had to work the mines under Ra, but she had carried water, not broken rocks. An aristocratic sort of slavery. Like carrying a Goa'uld.

"I'm here to take care of people," Janet said. "Sometimes that means medicine or surgery, sometimes that means an open ear. I'm here to take care of you, Sha're."

Sha're nodded, and looked away from the crib near her bed. Apophis' son was _under observation_ , same as she was, but he had barely stirred all night – he hadn't woken her once. It was unnatural for a child so young to sleep so deeply, so long.

He was an unnatural child.

"I am grateful for your care," she murmured, and drank the tea. Janet watched her, then raised her mug and took one long, delicate slip just as Sha're was bringing her own tea back down to her lap. They sat in silence for a while.

"I could get Daniel if you needed him," Janet said.

"No." She punctuated that with a shake of her head. Not Daniel, who was sleeping. Being made to sleep. In the morning O'Neill would lead him off to see if Skaara might be saved, now, quickly, with the knowledge Sha're had brought them from Amonet's life. Daniel would have come, would have stayed with her if she'd asked him to, but Sha're daughter of Kasuf did not beg. She'd told him to go, save her brother, bring him home.

She sighed.

"When I sleep I still feel the child," she said, risking a glance at the crib. Then, more tentatively, "He was my first."

Janet accepted that without questions or judgment. "Are they nightmares?"

Sha're shook her head. "It is hard for me to say," she said. "I'm never afraid, but sometimes I feel that I should be. Not just while dreaming. Waking, too. The child is dangerous..."

"He won't hurt anyone," Janet said. "We'll make sure of that."

"The child is dangerous," Sha're said again, with more force, this time. "I am afraid of what will happen if I allow myself to love him. But I fear as much what it will mean if I do not. He is _my_ son, but he is not. He is the son of Apophis and Amonet. And of a man I have never met. I know his face, but not his name. He is older than my city's walls."

Janet gave a voiceless _Ah._ "And you do love him? The child, I mean."

"I want to raise him. I want to teach him to be a good son and a good man." She ran her thumb along the rim of the mug. "On one of Amonet's worlds, twins were fed to crocodiles; so was any child born with their feet before their head, or with knotted locks of hair," she said. "They thought that any such child would grow up evil. How – how changed am I, that this would come to mind?"

Janet shifted her stool closer. "Listen. The things you've been through, I'd find it strange if you didn't have a few dark thoughts. It's all right. In fact, it's natural."

"We know the child has evil in him."

"Maybe, but you didn't catch it. And fortunately, our pragmatism doesn't have to involve crocodiles."

Sha're managed a small smile.

"If you need to step back from this, I'll make it happen," Janet said. "I know they've barely given you space to breathe."

"I hold the secrets of Amonet," Sha're said. "How can I step back?"

"You're more important than those secrets," Janet said. "Your health is worth more than whatever secrets you can tell them."

"I wonder." Sha're turned her head, regarding Janet out of one eye like a bird. "There are things I did not tell them."

Janet paused on that. Sha're wondered what she was thinking – whether she suspected her now, would accuse her of hiding something, of still bearing the taint of the demon on her heart, beneath her skin. But all the woman said, and that very carefully, was "Oh?"

"Things like this would be of no interest to a man," Sha're said into the tea. "Perhaps not even my husband. Will you–" She leaned forward, suddenly, to take Janet's wrist, feel the heat from the tea leave her hand and soak into the woman's pale skin. "Would you hear those things?" she asked. "They are..." She searched for a word. "Heavy."

Janet neither flinched back nor tried to take away her wrist. "Of course."

Sha're looked into her eyes, and returned her hand to the hot mug. She took another drink to settle her stomach, and weighed the mettle of the woman sitting with her. _Of course,_ she'd said. Too easy. But Janet was strong; she could see that. Sha're didn't feel uneasy about speaking to her.

"Amonet was frightened," she said. "Do you know of the god Amun?"

"I'm afraid I haven't heard of him," Janet said.

"His words were written in the temple of Sun Rising," Sha're said. "And also, I... know of him." She sighed, and brought her hand to rest against her belly. Amonet had repaired her body, changed it, but it still bore the marks of childbirth and would never shed those. Some things were never erased from the body. "Amonet knew him. The one who was hidden. She was of his lineage. This is the part I told to all of them: he became one of the stewards in Ra's territories, and she was his queen, at his side until Ra fell."

A note of satisfaction crept into her voice. She had witnessed Ra's fall. She had not wielded the weapon that killed him or even led the charge to topple the last of his guards on Abydos, but _she_ had opened the way. For Daniel, for O'Neill, for Skaara and her father and all the beating hearts and strong hands of her city, her people, her world. Her triumph was a shock felt through the stars.

"When Ra fell, his territories shattered," Sha're said. "Apophis killed Amun and took Amonet as his own. She who had known the secrets of he who knew the secrets of Ra. Apophis was the enemy. Apep-the-serpent who battled the sun every night, in the shadowy depths of the world.

"Apophis conceived a son on her, to take as his host. A host could hide nothing from him. But what of Amonet, then? She would be of no use to him. That is why Amonet was afraid." Her fingers drummed on the ceramic. "Sometimes, in a horrible way, I think the Goa'uld are very practical beasts," she said. "We have bodies, so they take us. We have strength, so they enslave us. We have numbers, so they employ us. And when they no longer need a thing they cast it aside."

"Some people would call that practical," Janet agreed. "Of course, some people would call it monstrous."

"They are monsters," Sha're agreed. "Practical monsters. The men who ask me all those questions are very practical men." She tilted her head. "Do you... dislike practical things, perhaps?"

"Hm?" Janet seemed surprised, straightening up and blinking. "Oh, no. Practicality is a wonderful thing, especially in my profession. But I think there are different kinds of practicality." She looked down. "One kind has heart."

"She did not kill me," Sha're blurted. "I didn't tell them that. Amonet could have killed me before the Tok'ra took her away, and instead she let me live. Perhaps because I could look after her child, perhaps because it would not avail her to make me die. If I knew no better, I would say that Amonet had heart." She gripped the mug. "Do you know how we used to sing of Amun as children?

" _Amun who comes at the voice of the poor in distress, who gives breath to him who is wretched. You are Amun, the Lord of the silent, who comes at the voice of the poor; when I call to you in my distress You come and rescue me. Though the servant was disposed to do evil, the Lord is disposed to forgive._

"I'm so confused," she said. "I wake up and I tell myself, _You are Sha're. You have been Sha're since your marriage to Daniel, and before, you were Sha'uri._ And I know my own name, but I am losing, I think, who I am."

She made herself laugh over the tea.

"I'm sorry. My thoughts are all scattered."

"You're not losing who you are, Sha're," Janet said, and touched her arm. "We all see things that change us. You've seen more than most people. It's healthy to learn from those things, and you're strong enough not to let them overwhelm you."

Sha're felt her lips curve, and a gentler heat rose up into her cheeks. "You've been talking to my Daniel."

"Give me some credit. Professional observation."

Sha're inhaled. "If the child grows up to be evil, will we feed it to the crocodiles?" she asked.

It took a moment for Janet to follow the change in topic, and the small smile she'd been sporting faded. "The Tok'ra have offered to have one of their own take him as a host," she said, gently. "Try to teach him how to reject the ways of the Goa'uld."

Sha're shuddered. "They have crocodile eyes. Cold. Considering." She looked up, meeting Janet's eyes, feeling her own burn. "But they freed me from Amonet. _Doctor_ ," she said, and her voice cracked. Her hands tightened on the mug and she controlled the crack, beat it back beneath her throat. "I have to know if _I_ am to be the child's mother. I would give Apophis' son to the Tok'ra without complaint. Not my own."

Janet set her mug aside and said, quite deliberately, "I think that's your decision."

"How can I make that decision?"

Janet exhaled. "You know what else I think?" she asked, and came around to lay both hands on Sha're's arm. "I think you don't have to make that decision tonight. Not even tomorrow. I think the kid has a lot of growing up to do, and I think he's not dangerous yet – definitely not before he's walking and talking, at any rate. I think we'll have time to get to know him while he grows up, and I think we'll be able to make any and all decisions as they become necessary. And," she added, and there was iron in her grip, steel in her eyes, and Sha're felt the way she had when striking the flint to light the torch that illuminated the walls of the temple that birthed her rebellion. She felt uncertain, small and unsteady, but hairsbreadths away from being tall as the gods and as strong. "I think that if anyone, from the Joint Chiefs to your own father, says you can't choose how deep you want to be in this, at any time... I think they'll have to come through me."

Janet smiled. Sha're responded, closing her eyes and letting the torch blaze up. "A practical woman yourself, doctor."

"Or a jaded romantic," Janet said. "I believe that the worst of this is behind you. Whatever happens from here on out, you have friends. And you have Daniel – who, believe me, will walk through fire and ice for you. And the rest of SG-1 will walk through fire and storm for him. Believe me, they have before."

Sha're smiled.

"Thank you for listening." She handed back the empty mug. "I am lighter now."

"Would you like to go back to sleep?"

"I think so." She closed her eyes, kept smiling. "And you will continue to be here to observe me?"

"Through the night, Sha're. I promise."

"Then I would like to sleep again." She pulled the blanket off her shoulders and lay herself back. "Thank you, doctor."

"Call me Janet," Janet said, and cleared the mugs away.

As Janet readjusted the curtains around her bed, pulling them snug and closed, Sha're rolled onto her side and looked into the crib, where the strange child was still asleep.

" _May your ka be kind,_ " she whispered, and closed her eyes. She shifted her arm under herself, pressing her palm into her belly again, focusing her attention inward. " _May your ka be kind; may you forgive; it shall not happen again._ "

\- END -


End file.
